Colorado Springs Fire Chief Manuel Navarro will retire in October

He was too short to be a cop. So when Manuel "Manny" Navarro "just needed a job," he took a stab at firefighting. Turns out, he made a wise career move: On Oct. 10 - after 42 years in firefighting - the 61-year-old Colorado Springs fire chief will retire.

Navarro's 14-year tenure in Colorado Springs has been marked by the opening of four new fire stations, implementing wildfire prevention programs and watching the fruits of his labor come together as crews put out the deadly 2007 Castle West Apartments fire.

Since arriving from Oakland, Calif., in January 1994, Navarro has also faced public reprimand, suspension and a vote of dissatisfaction by some employees.

"There were some times that were just frustrating trying to get accomplished what we needed to get accomplished," Navarro said Monday after the city announced his retirement. "Some of the challenges relative to the budget and so on and needs of the department. And those are tough. But they get overshadowed real quick 'cause you start getting successful."

Monday, his colleagues hailed his service to the city.

"Fourteen years as a fire chief is damn near unheard of. I think three to five years is the average. It's a pressure cooker position, because the buck stops there," said Richard Brown, acting deputy chief of operations.

"Chief Navarro is by far the most knowledgeable and experienced fire fighter in the Front Range, if not the state," said Deputy Chief Dan Raider. "Under his leadership, he brought our department to a new level."

Raider and Mayor Lionel Rivera said Navarro built up the leadership and infrastructure within the department that will ensure its success in his absence.

"He will be missed," Rivera said. "He has been a leader in this community, certainly in the Hispanic community."

Navarro's decision to retire was one he made with his family, he said, and not one centered on his past battles with cancer. He survived immune cell cancer eight years ago and is nearly free of the prostate cancer discovered almost four years ago.

"Does that add into (my decision)? Not really," Navarro said. "But the reality is, you think differently when you've been down that path."

Navarro's career is one punctuated by happenstance.

He dropped out of college to get married, and when his attempt to follow a family member's footsteps into law enforcement was blocked by a 5-foot-9-inch height requirement, the 5-foot-8 Navarro followed another family member into fire service in the San Francisco Bay Area.

He eventually settled into the Oakland Fire Department, where he rose to deputy chief after his service in a 1991 wildfire that destroyed 3,300 homes and killed 25 people in three and a half hours.

Navarro didn't consider heading his own department until the Oakland chief stopped him in the middle of a briefing to ask why hadn't pursued a job as chief elsewhere. Then an unsolicited headhunting flier from Colorado Springs arrived.

"The department really wanted someone from the outside; they were very challenged," Navarro said. "And to me that's exciting to take on new challenges."

Those challenges would include an outcry that would eventually thwart his proposal in 1997 to close west side Station No. 3 to pay for more staff at Station No. 9 on Garden of the Gods Road.

During the uproar, Navarro issued a gag order, telling Springs firefighters they would be disciplined for publicly criticizing policy decisions. He rescinded the order after the ACLU filed a lawsuit.

"I think it is fair to say that anytime you're trying to change a culture or a behavior or implement anything, not everybody is going walk in and say, ‘My goodness, that is the greatest thing that we've ever heard; why didn't we think of that?'" Navarro said Monday. "There are always those critics that are out there."

In August 2004, then-City Manager Lorne Kramer suspended Navarro for a week after the fire chief violated city policy by allowing his name and title to appear on a flier endorsing El Paso County Commission candidate Jack Gloriod. Gloriod lost the Republican primary to Sallie Clark, a former city councilwoman who had butted heads with Navarro over the Station No. 3 closing.

Navarro also caught flak in June 2007 following reports that he, Raider and Deputy Chief Steve Cox golfed while on duty and drove fire vehicles to and from the courses. Although he said the golfing took place while he was offduty, he halted the practice.

Still, the incident may have hurt his credibility with the rank and file: The results of an internal survey in December showed that 42 percent of firefighters didn't think senior management led by example, and they cited the golf incident as one reason.

Since then, said the president of the local firefighters union, top administrators have made strides to address the concerns outlined in the December survey, including a weekly closedcircuit television broadcast with Navarro or his deputy chiefs to open communication with employees.

"I think his leadership skills have done us very well over the years," said Mike Smaldino, president of the Colorado Springs Professional Firefighters Association, Local 5.

Navarro said he is leaving having seen a test of the efforts he poured into the department. On Jan. 16, 2007, the 135-unit Castle West Apartments near Academy Boulevard and Uintah Street was destroyed by fire, killing two and leaving hundreds homeless.

"You gotta understand, that fire was not the fire. What that fire represents is all the training, everybody we've hired, everybody we've promoted, every piece of apparatus we've bought - because the apparatus when I got here was in horrible condition - all the tools and equipment, all those little pieces," he said. "The single point is that focus on that bigger fire but it's all the stuff that came in behind it."

He said Monday he is entertaining "inquiries" from other organizations, but has not decided whether he will keep working.

-

Gazette reporter Bill Reed contributed to this report.


MANUEL "MANNY" NAVARRO

Born: Oct. 13, 1946 in Oakland, Calif.
Education: Associate of Arts, Chabot College, Hayward, Calif, 1971; Bachelor of Arts, California State University, Hayward, Calif., 1986
Family: Married, one adult daughter
Career: Fire service: joined fire department in Livermore, Calif., in 1966 at age 19; served 22 years in the Oakland Fire Department. Hired as Colorado Springs Fire Department chief in 1994.
Hobbies: fishing, hunting, weight lifting and golf